


He's Beauty, He's Gr-ace, He's getting real tired of the puns, Han

by PirateArrowXAB



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Aro/Ace Luke Skywalker, Asexual Luke, Asexual Luke Skywalker, Gen, It's all his fault, Luke unleashed the pun monster, save Luke Skywalker 2k18
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-18
Updated: 2018-02-18
Packaged: 2019-03-20 22:52:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13727691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PirateArrowXAB/pseuds/PirateArrowXAB
Summary: "Luke starts to talk to his nearest and dearest about his aro and/or aceness. He expects confusion or sympathy. Instead he gets overwhelming acceptance. And puns. Dear God so many puns."He expected confusion. He fretted about tentative nods and clarification of what exactly he meant by asexuality, the night ending with awkward conversation and stilted goodbyes.He wasn't expecting Han to laugh, make a joke, laugh more and fall asleep on the floor, especially given that that was the usual end to their late night drinking sessions.Many thanks to Fiachra for the prompt and title, and AceinSpace on Tumblr for hosting this lovely fic drive!





	He's Beauty, He's Gr-ace, He's getting real tired of the puns, Han

“She’s just not my type, and I’ve been getting more missions lately, and I think I should tell you I’m asexual.”  
Luke continues to babble out explanations, anything he can think of, anything to get the resigned acceptance off Han’s face, when he realises that the expression is indeed gone. It’s been replaced by confusion.

And then Luke realises what he’s just said.

Growing up in a desert hellscape with your aunt, uncle, and the occasional Womp Rat mischief to keep you company doesn’t really encourage romance, and Luke had never taken much interest in it anyway. There were always chores to rush home to, parts and pieces to collect and buy and sell, this and that and everything in between. The fact came to his attention after Biggs, confident and funny and often with an admirer hanging off his arm, after Biggs had left for the academy. It takes his only friend leaving for Luke to realise the surprising dearth of close acquaintances and family in his life. He spends some time worrying that he’s messed up his future, that his closeness with Biggs perhaps left him cold and aloof to others, but the spell of wondering doesn’t last long.  
There’s this and that and everything in between to be done, after all.

And then there isn’t.

But there is. There’s this and that and everything in between, supply runs and buying and selling and collection and really just glorified chores. There’s Wedge, often with an admirer hanging off his arm.

There’s no aunt or uncle or occasional mischief of Womp rats. 

There is. There is a princess, who always makes time to meet him to discuss his missions, his home, his previous life. There is a smuggler and his first mate, who drag him along to nights of drinking and cards and friends. Who drag him back to their ship afterwards, for more of the same and gossiping like a trio of schoolgirls and waking up on the sofa of the main hold, a vest balled under his head and blanket over him, kindly positioned with the grease stains face up.

There’s still no time to think about it, really, except for ‘it’ being such an important subject. Not much else entertainment when you’re stuck on an icy hellhole (much like the fiery hellhole, Luke realises later. It’s just that now he has people who care to include him. Or at least ask.)

They’re in the Falcon’s hold, Luke and Han and Chewbacca and, surprisingly, Leia. She’ll turn up to their sessions occasionally, invited by Luke or Chewie in passing. Han invites her too, of course. Luke thinks she might only refuse those invitations out of principle.

Regardless.

They’re sprawled around the hold, humans tipsy with the whiskey that was ‘totally legal and not at all brewed in the third corridor by the Wampa entrance, your worship’ (“Kriff, you’re all messes” quips the only being in the room with anything resembling a drinking tolerance). Han’s draped over the couch, grinning at Leia, swaying his arm back and forth.  
“C’moooooon, you can tell us.”  
“And it’s mandatory I have a secret… secret longing for somebody on base because?”  
Han squints at her, waving arm lifting to allow him to stab his finger in her direction.  
“I knoooow that look, you got your eye on somebodddyy”  
Leia’s getting upset, Luke can tell. He’s surprised that Han can’t, given how much drunker Luke is than the smuggler. He sits up; room swaying around him, ready to do… something, Leia doesn’t like him leaping to her defence, when Han turns his finger of rude pointing gestures to Luke.  
“Youuu, though, you I gotta surprise for.”

Oh no. Luke hasn’t historically been fond of romantically-minded Han’s surprises. Romantically-minded Han can be a bit of a prick. A prick with a never-ending list of pretty people.

“There’s… there’s Sal, you know, the engineer? An’ she was asking about youuu, and I said I’d tip you a wink and a nudge and a go bang her, kid.”

Leia looks mildly horrified in the background, but seems to have dismissed this as drunk Han being friendly in his drunk Han-esque way, and is reaching for the bottle of “legal” alcohol.

Luke, though. Luke isn’t horrified, genuinely or dramatically. He’s just resigned at this point. Han gets this way every so often, drunk or no, offering up names to make Luke feel like he’s ‘fitting in’, or making sure he’s ‘not lonely’. Luke knows how this goes.

He refuses, gives Han some variation of every excuse he’s given before. Han hides it well, but he’ll be hurt at Luke’s dismissal of his suggestion, and the evening will be soured. Cold and aloof, the Skywalker kid with so few friends.

It’s perhaps this knowledge, perhaps the moonshine, but Luke blurts out his excuse without thinking.

“… and I think I should tell you I’m asexual.”

And Han is confused, and over the roaring in his ears he can dimly hear a delicate ‘clink’ as Leia puts the bottle back on the table, and he registers Chewie turning towards him and

And Han doesn’t look confused any more. There’s a range of emotions struggling for superiority across his face, bemusement and worry and incredulous smiling muddled back and forth.

“Shit, kid, shit I’m sorry, I’ve been throwing people at you, I’ve been, I’ve been a real dick lately. I shoulda layed off, shoulda known the guy who took out the death star could make up his own mi-iiii waiiiit.

There’s a grin spreading over Han’s face, loose and beaming, eyes bright.

“Ohhhh fuck, fuck kid. You, you shot down the death star. You’re our own fuckin ace in the hole”

And thus, having delivered his verdict, Han and his unfortunate drunken tendencies fall off the couch and into unconsciousness.

Luke just stares. Han’s on the floor, face pressed lovingly to the grease-stained panels. Leia and Chewie are staring at him, he can tell.

He bursts out laughing.

If there’s a few tears mixed in, relief and joy overwhelming him, Leia and Chewie kindly don’t mention it.

They leave Chewie to put his captain to bed, being so kind as to have dragged him as far as his bunk after Luke calmed down a little. Leia keeps – just – looking at him, bemused smile on her face. It’s three am, cold and silent in their Hoth base, and Leia huffs and stops.

“Ace, huh?”

He nods.

“Heh. Trust the nerfherder to make puns when you tell us something important”

“Oh, no”, he stammers, stopping to look at her properly. “I liked the pun, he didn’t make a big thing out of it, he apologized and-“

Leia has stopped as well, head cocked to the side, smile widening to a grin as she assesses him. She reaches up, ruffles her hands through his hair, pulls his head down.  
“Luke”, she grins, meeting his gaze before stretching up to press a quick kiss to his forehead.  
“I think you’re am-ace-thing.”

There might be more tears. There’s more laughter. There’s a hug, warm and lasting and only slightly ruined by Chewie sticking his head through the Falcon’s door to warble vague threats at them to “get off my lawn you drunken idiots”, and the dawning realization that they’ve only moved about three meters since leaving the falcon.

Hoth snowgrass hooch. Not even once.

Luke wakes up the next morning and everything is perfect for approximately seven seconds. Then the hangover hits. Then the realization that everything he confessed, every accepting gesture was done under the potent influence of Wedge’s latest experiments with Hoth flora. Then the cold. He’s from Tatooine, OK? It’s always gonna ruin his day.

He stumbles down to the falcon, blearily exchanging morning greetings and allowing the force to guide his path to best avoid anybody even remotely able to give him extra shifts for his obvious hangover. 

He arrives in the Falcon’s main hold eventually, bypassing a disgustingly cheerful Chewbacca (damn fuckin’ Wookie constitution). Han’s seated with a mug of caf inside, hair sticking up on one side and grease stains on his forehead. Oops. He looks up at Luke as he collapses onto the seat across from him. There’s no quip at Luke’s appearance. No lazy cock of the head to acknowledge the epic drinking session. Just hands curled around a chipped mug; white knuckled, and tight lipped and eyes hooded.

“Kid. Last night. I, uh, I need to apologise.”  
“Han, what-“  
“No, I was a dick, you told me something important and-“  
“Han, it’s fine. I-”  
“No. Kid, no. You don’t just forgive me for that, I shouldn’t have made it into a joke, I know it’s not fair, and I need you to be straight with me, so-“  
“Can’t”

Han looks up sharply at that, mouth falling open.

“I know you think you made it out to be a stupid joke, but, no, no you didn’t, it, it was light, and we could laugh and I needed that, Han. I don’t want it to be some huge thing; you can make stupid jokes all you want. It’s, it’s great, and-“

And Han is hugging him, caf abandoned on the table, It’s an awful hug, they both stink of hangover and need showers.  
And Luke clings to Han, face buried in his grease stained hug. Best damn hug he’s had since last night. 

Han huffs again, chin resting on Luke’s head.  
“So. Caf? You got a full day ahead of leading the squad, yeah?”

The force is screaming in his ear, letting Luke know that Han has that grin on his face, and Oh no. Luke realises what he’s just given Han free reign to do.

“Can’t have the rebellion’s flying ace showing up half asleep”

Luke starts to struggle, Han’s arms tightening around him as the smuggler laughs, sounding utterly delighted.

“Remind me, Kid, you like your caf like you like your men? Or your women? Oh no wait you don’t take caf, right?”

Han has full permission to make puns. Luke has given Han puns.  
Maybe Vader will find them today, and Luke will be saved. Han continues above him, and Luke relents to the hug. If he’s smiling, well, who’ll know?

“I mean you need a good breakfast if you wanna ace your drills today, Kid!”

Now. If he can somehow prevent Leia and Chewie from finding out about the pun blessing, that’d be ace.

Shit.

He starts struggling again. Clearly Han’s contagious. It’s for the good of everyone if he gets out of this awful, wonderful hug and strangles Han. Chewie will understand. Leia will probably give him another medal. Han’s laughing, and ruffling his hair, and outside there’s a Wookie who might save him and might suggest more puns, and a princess who’ll join in only if she has better ideas than Han, and there’s this and that and everything in between to be done. And the force shows him jokes, and a rain of particular playing cards over his head one day (and kid, let me tell you, card confetti is way more fuckin expensive than you’d think if you’re only using four cards from each box), and stupid t-shirts and a bloody clone and every conceivable joke he can think of about said bloody clone, and hell, an occasional mischief of Womp rats or drunken idiot friends.

And if there are tears above the smile, well, they’re happy. And he’s sure Han won’t mind.

His stupid shirt needs washed anyway.

**Author's Note:**

> You see that force vision? You see clone jokes and expensive confetti?
> 
> Watch this sp-ace ;)
> 
> (Also seriously thank you Fiachra for the title suggestion, pls check out this awesome writer slash lifesaver)


End file.
